


Us

by theheadandthekin



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, One Shot, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-03
Updated: 2015-10-03
Packaged: 2018-04-24 15:41:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4925407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theheadandthekin/pseuds/theheadandthekin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Immediately post-3x01 ("I, Witness"), Crane learns the cabin is not longer habitable, so Abbie offers a solution. Things don't go quite as intended.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Us

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr.

“Lieutenant.” He watches a smile tease around the corners of her eyes at the endearment. “I believe I should call it a night. Would you be so kind as to take me out to the cabin? I promise I will procure my own conveyance soon.”

Abbie sits back and sighs. “County condemned the cabin. Big storm last April, tree went right through the middle of it.”

Crane looks past her a moment before focusing back. “Perhaps that’s for the best. Well, then, I shall check back into the hotel.”

“You got a credit card now?” She raises her eyebrows, teasing.

“Indeed.”

“C’mon.” Abbie stands up and grabs her jacket. “Let me find Jenny and say goodbye. You can stay at my place. Save your money for the taxes on that castle you lucked into.”

“It’s not a—” He cuts himself off at her wide grin. “Thank you. I shall accept your offer.”

* * *

She shows him around—kitchen, laundry, bathroom, guestroom—pointing out the TV, the coffee pot, and the towels. Her new home is small but the rooms are spacious. And she’s proud of it.

“I’m going to be right across the hall from you if you need anything. Just … yeah, what’s mine is yours. I’ll be up early and try not to disturb you.”

“I’ll not burden you for long.”

She leans back against the counter, bracing her hands on the edge. “I missed you burdening me, Crane.” She pauses, pursing her lips and looking away, out the kitchen window and into the night. “I missed you.”

He stays frozen in place, waiting.

“I missed you _so much._ ” Her eyes finally meet his, and they’re shining with a film of tears. “I didn’t want to. I tried not to. I get it; I know why you left, why you needed to be alone. Even why you didn’t want to write or text or call. That you had to find your own way in this big, crazy world. I _get it._ ”

Unable to bear the sight of her distress, he moves within an arm’s length of her, ready to draw her in if she needs.

“But after so long, got to the point of thinking you might not come back at all.” Her voice is thin and watery, conveying far more than her words.

“Lieutenant,” he whispers, daring to reach out and brush a hand up her neck, the first touch he’s initiated since his return. “Abbie. Never did I intend my sojourn away from you to be permanent.”

She rocks slightly forward off the counter and lays a hand over his, carefully drawing it around to press a soft kiss against his wrist. He closes his eyes at this first, unexpected sensation of her lips on his skin.

“Crane,” she half swallows. Her unshed tears are turning her usually clear speech froggy. “Apocalypse be damned. Biblical, Sumerian prophecies be damned. We’re _us._ We _choose_ this.”

Clouding over the hurt, there’s defiance and determination in her eyes now, laced with assurance and a pinch of mirth. He starts to lean down—she’s so petite—and abruptly changes tactics, dropping his arms to boost her up onto the counter.  

“Agreed.” He answers, and shifts his hands from her backside down her thighs, until he’s got hold of her knees, standing between them.

“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” She asks, not bothering to elaborate. Not that it was ever a question of _if_ , because it never had been, but _when._ Now that most of the regret and uncertainty between them has been chased away for now, and they’ve made a fresh start _...  
_

“More than.”

Abbie squeezes his hips between her thighs, just enough to try to motivate him to action; she can lay the groundwork, but he has to make the final move. “Then maybe you should do something about, I don’t know, the fact that you aren’t kissing me yet?”

“Anything you ask, Lieutenant. I do not desire to keep you waiting any longer.”

She laughs lightly into the kiss at first, a chaste affirmation of intention. But then he slides her forward, pressing her center flush against the front of his breeches, and with a wicked look, claims her lips again. This time, there’s nothing chaste about it.

* * *

The guestroom goes unused.

They hardly make it to Abbie’s bedroom as it is, and only at Crane’s insistence that the countertop—and the table, and the wall, and the floor—are unfit places for their first intimate encounter.

“Next time. And the time after.” she says. She means it.

* * *

Abbie wakes up to a hand stroking her bare back.

“Morning,” she murmurs against Crane’s chest.

“A _good_ morning?”

She props her head up to look at him and raises her eyebrows. “You fishing for compliments?”

“Perhaps. Although I heard quite a number a few short hours ago.”

“Don’t let it go to your head.” She reaches for her phone on the opposite nightstand, and he takes the opportunity to lay an open-mouthed kiss on her shoulder. “ _Shit._ ”

“Late?”

“Yeah.” She goes to push over him, but pauses. “You’ll be here, right?”

He reaches up to cradle her face, running a thumb over her lips. “Abbie, I’m not going anywhere. And never again, at least within my power, without you. This is home.”

“Yeah, it is.”


End file.
